


No problem

by ForkBoy89



Category: Just Roll With It (Podcast)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Cuddling & Snuggling, Dancing, Fluff, I guess this counts as slow burn ??, Kissing, M/M, Slow Burn, Slow Dancing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 13:02:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 17,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29559519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForkBoy89/pseuds/ForkBoy89
Summary: Basically this is what would've happened after ep 9 up until the end of Convergence but mostly Krangle. It's my way of coping with a loss of a huge comfort show and an equally huge comfort ship. It's gonna be kinda long too I predict.
Relationships: Kasper/Strangle MaCock
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13





	1. Reunited

**Author's Note:**

> so from the draft i have written out right now it seems like this is gonna be at least 8 chapters cause i have many ideas and i really need this to cope so. krangle shippers come get yalls juice.

Kasper awoke with nothing but the cold floor underneath him. The first thing he saw was the bright, metallic ceiling above him, and as he looked out the window: the night sky. Wait. The night sky? It really seemed like it was supposed to be morning already! As he slowly sat up rubbing his eyes, he took a few seconds to recall what exactly happened and where he was, and when he did, he smiled to himself. It wasn't the night sky. It was space. He was in the Stranglehold. Strangle was back. He was alive and okay and not eaten by a dragon. After spending so many days thinking he was gone forever, dead before their adventure had even properly started, the thought of Strangle being back seemed too good to be true. And yet it was.

Kasper slowly got up and after performing some stretches to help his aching muscles he made his way through the cold metal hallway, his heart beating a little bit faster than normal. He needed to be 100% sure he was really here. He needed to know it wasn't a dream. He entered the kitchen, and sure enough, there he was - Strangle MaCock in the flesh, facing the stove, undoubtedly preparing some kind of breakfast. The whole room smelled of eggs and bacon. Kasper smiled to himself once more exhaling quite a bit of air, that he didn't realized he was holding in for so long.

"Good morning!" he said rather loudly and abruptly, causing Strangle to jump and then turn around.

"Oh! It's only you. Good morning" Kasper gave him a smile and leaned against the doorframe "Don't scare me like that, Kasper! I'm not really used to having other people around here you know"

"Sorry" he replied, walking up to the table and taking a seat on one of the four black leather chairs "Whatcha making?"

"Bacon and scrambled eggs" he flipped a piece of meat in the pan with a wooden spatula he held in one of his large hands.

"Don't you mean  strangled eggs?"

Strangle paused for a second before replying: "With all the strangle puns I make I'm genuinely surprised and upset that I've never thought of that" Kasper chuckled before the other man continued "Anyway, do you want some too? I can just throw a few more in there, it's not a problem"

Before he could get any kind of answer, they both heard a familiar voice as a certain young alchemist walked into the room. Alastyr's hair was even more straggly than usual and the sleeves of his coat, especially the left one, were severely mangled. He readjusted the goggles on his head.

"Are you frying bacon? Ohh, I haven't had any in so long, can I have some? Please?" He looked as though his green eyes were sparkling, clearly a big fan of bacon.

"Alastyr!" Kasper glared at him "Be more polite! We're guests here!"

"It's alright" Strangle smiled and opened the fridge getting more eggs and bacon out "It's a big pan, I'll just make breakfast for everyone. It's the least I can do for you guys, when you're literally helping me save a world" he cracked a few more eggs and poured their contents into the pan.

"Speaking of" Alastyr pulled up a seat "We're gonna go try and get all the eggs back today. The golden ones, I mean, not the ones you're cracking right now. You wanna go with us?"

"I'm afraid I'm still a little bit under the weather" Strangle put his elbow up to his nose and wiped it with the sleeve of his black hoodie "I'm recovering alright, but if I left to go adventuring now I might fall sick again"

Indeed, Strangle did not yet look completely healthy. His nose was red and you could hear him sniffling from time to time. Due to the good night's sleep he got he wasn't as weak as yesterday, he was standing completely fine on his own, but he definitely didn't look fit for a full on adventure - especially since the next world the eggs brought them into could be quite literally anything.

Soon enough the rest of the party joined them in the kitchen. Walking in, Kroe had his hands placed on his back and a face of pure pain. They were hearing complaints about his sore muscles from an unsuccessful workout the night before all throughout the meal and long after they all emptied their respective plates. The food was great - being alone in space for so long, Strangle clearly must've spent a fair share of his time learning how to cook. One might think it's hard to mess up eggs and bacon but in fact, making them taste amazing is equally difficult.

After putting the plates and utensils into an unknown to the party members machine called "the dishwasher" (Alastyr's amazement with the technological wonders of the Stranglehold grew with every second), everyone made their way into the main area of the spaceship to prepare for their next mission. Except for Strangle - after finishing his meal he stayed sitting at the table. Kasper was just about to leave with the rest of the crew when he noticed him staying behind everyone else.

"Are you coming?" he stopped and turned his head around as the others left the room.

"No, like I said: I'm still a little sick, it probably wouldn't be a good idea-"

"Yeah, yeah I know" Kasper interrupted "But I still thought you were gonna say goodbye before we left or something" 

"I was planning on doing that later" Strangle gave him a slightly smug smile "But if you insist on doing it now..." 

He stood up from his seat and walked up to Kasper. Kasper was a pretty tall guy, but Strangle was still taller, and his impressive muscles and broad shoulders made him appear even bigger than he really was. He would definitely be a very intimidating enemy to make, but having him on your side made a powerful ally. And to Kasper he certainly made a powerful, but also very, very attractive ally.

Strangle put his hand on Kasper's shoulder and looked directly into his eyes with a smile that made his knees weak and heart do a 360.

"I hope you manage to recover what was lost. I wish I could go with you, but I need to look out for my health too, you understand, right?" he got a single nod in response "I promise I'll be there next time. I know this is a mission and not just a weekend trip or vacation, but I hope you still have fun"

"I hope you have fun too... somehow. Maybe make yourself some soup, stay in bed, don't overwork yourself, drink water-" Strangle interrupted him with a chuckle.

"I know how to take care of myself, Kasper. I'll be fine"

"I don't doubt that, I'm just looking out for you" 

A smile crept across Strangle's face once more, this time it was more of a warm one.

"I don't get people looking out for me often. Thank you"

"Oh, um- no problem" before Kasper could finish he got pulled in for a hug. He returned the hug immediately, putting his arms around Strangle's shoulders and on his back. He resisted the urge to put one of his hands in his hair and stroke it lightly. He didn't wanna be too much too fast. Maybe he'll do it when they have a reunion hug after he comes back from the new world they were going to. Or maybe he'll be too nervous again.

"Oh, before I forget" Kasper pulled away from the embrace and reached to his front pocket, where he put the red bandanna folded into a handkerchief. He pulled it out and handed it to Strangle. "In the heat of the moment of you being back and all, I forgot to give it back to you yesterday. So.. here, you can have it back now" as he tried to pass the bandanna to him, Strangle's expression was one of slight confusion. He looked down at it, the back at Kasper.

"I thought you were keeping it? I noticed you had it yesterday and, um.." he looked to the side and scratched the back of his neck, looking a little nervous or... embarrassed? "It made me feel really nice that you kept it. I didn't think you would" Kasper's expression instantly shifted 

"Of course I kept it! Did you think I was going to throw it out or something? Of course not!" his voice sounded slightly offended, but not mad.

"Yeah, it does make a lot less sense when you put it like that" Strangle's eyes went back to meet his "Still, the fact that you still have it, it.. means a lot to me. And it would mean a lot to me if you... keep having it? If you keep it, I mean" Kasper felt his face get slightly warmer and he hoped to whatever god they had here in space that he wasn't blushing right now.

"We-well, I have always looked good in red" he said quietly, folding the bandanna to put it back in his pocket.

"Agreed" Strangle gave him one more gentle pat on the shoulder as he walked past him towards the exit "I'm gonna go 'stay in bed' and 'eat soup' and all the other stuff you told me to do to get better"

"Have fun with that" Kasper turned around to watch him leave.

"You too. Stay safe. See you in a few days"

"See you" 

Kasper brushed his fingers across the red bandanna in his pocket as Strangle left the room. Yep. Definitely not a dream. He pulled the bandanna closer to his heart. Definitely, 100% real.


	2. Drunk words are sober thoughts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The party finds themselves in a new world, unpleasant in more ways than one.

They were moving through a room full of people, constantly bumping into someone. The music was loud and unpleasant to the ear. Kasper kept hitting his head on low hanging, light refracting orbs - "disco balls" is what they seemed to be called. A short human woman ran between them, pushing Alastyr out of her way, seemingly trying to get away from some creepy guy bothering her and lose him in the crowd. The guy accidentally spilled some of his alcoholic smelling drink right on Flynn's head. And all that why trying not to lose absolutely piss face drunk Kroe.

Apparently, this is what the parties in this world looked like.

When they finally left the room, Kasper closed the door behind them.

"Let's never go back there again" 

"Fortunately, we don't have to" Alastyr took another look at the piece of paper in his hand "If that man didn't lie to us, the basement door should lead us to the eggs. We're in luck that it's unguarded!"

And right as the young alchemist said those words, the door behind them opened with overwhelming force. The sound of horrible music and smell of sweat and alcohol hit them out of nowhere, and so did the man walking through the door. He bumped into Alastyr almost knocking him over, then walked past them without even a "sorry" and turned the corner. 

Kasper glared at his young friend.

"If that guy is now standing in front of the door to the basement guarding it, I'm gonna smack you, kid" Kroe took a peek behind the corner and gave Kasper a knowing look, causing him to immediately smack Alastyr on the back of the head "See! You jinxed it!"

"Ow!" Alastyr scrunched his nose "I didn't 'jinx' anything! That's not how this works!" 

"Never mind if he jinxed it or not" Flynn stepped in "We have to do something about that guy!"

"I think he's the one who was going after that short lady. You know, in the party room" said Alastyr, also taking a peek behind the corner.

"Great, he's an asshole - we don't have to feel bad about killing him"

"Kasper!" Alastyr exclaimed a little too loudly, and immediately lowered his voice "We're not killing him!"

"Well, what other options do you see here, kid?"

"I'm glad you asked" he looked up at him a little bit nervously "You know that spell that lets you turn into other people?" 

Kasper squinted his eyes.

"I do not like where this is going, Alastyr"

"I was just thinking" the kid continued "Maybe you can turn into that girl he was going after? Or just any girl for that matter, and you know... hit on him a little? Convince him to let us in?" Flynn covered his mouth with his hand to stop himself from laughing.

"No!" Kasper's voice turned defensive "Alastyr, I am not doing that!"

"Why not!? You just have to flirt with him a little! You don't have to do anything else!"

"I-" he glanced around the room at every one of his friends, his face getting slightly warm again. Thankfully, the overwhelming heat made all of their cheeks red already, so blushing didn't make much of a difference "I have my reasons.."

"Hm" Kroe looked up at him, his eyes still a bit glazed over from the alcohol "Do any of the reasons start with 'Strangle' and end with 'MaCock'?" he chortled loudly.

Kasper froze. What the fuck. What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck. 

"I- you- h-" he couldn't get out a single word "KROE! First of all: NO! Second of all: shut up!"

"Kasper!" Alastyr protectively put an arm around his drunk friend "Don't yell at him, he's just joking! He's drunk!"

"If you don't do it we're gonna think it's trueee" teased Kroe.

And as tension started to rise, and Kasper's face began to get more red, with Alastyr desperately trying to calm down both of his friends, barely managing to prevent the drunk one from falling over - Flynn poked his head from behind the corner. 

"Hey, idiots! Cleared the way for you" he started heading towards the basement door. 

Kasper and Alastyr ran up to him instantly. Kroe attempted to and completely ate shit on the floor, but got up a few seconds after and caught up to the other guys. Flynn wasn't lying: the man previously standing in their way was laying passed out on the ground before their very eyes.

"As hilarious as it would've been to see girl Kasper try and flirt with this guy" the halfling carefully avoided stepping on any of the limbs of the aforementioned guy lying unconscious in a starfish position in the middle of the hallway "You were taking too long to get to it. So I just got Geruda to knock him out" 

A faint 'You're welcome, kid!' could be heard from the bag draped across Flynn's shoulder. 

Kroe and Alastyr immediately followed behind, seemingly already forgetting what just happened: one because of his childish naivety, the other because of the unholy amounts of alcohol in his bloodstream. 

But Kasper couldn't get the thought out of his head. Was he really being THAT obvious? No, it was just a joke, he was just joking... But that "joke" couldn't have come from nowhere, right? Was Kroe just guessing? Was he suspecting it? Or did he k n o w?

Questions like these kept running through Kasper's head as they descended down the basement stairs, which were just about to prove themselves to lead to more that just an old dusty room.


	3. Some advice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kasper and Kroe have a heart to heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i forgot to mention this before but i actually have not seen that part of ep 8 where they lost the eggs and obviously i can't watch it, so the way they get them back may not be 100% canon compliant, sorry in advance! also i really hope everyone's enjoying the story, thank you for all the love, it's been really fun writing this so far and i'm only getting started ;)

Kasper was laying on the extremely uncomfortable floor of the labyrinth the party had found themselves in. He flicked a pebble which was imbedding itself into his shoulder out of the way and tried to get at least a little bit more comfortable. To everyone's surprise - though at this point they really should've been expecting something like this to happen - what was supposed to be just a regular basement turned out to be a twisting maze full of riddles and traps. But at the end of it - allegedly - lied the lost golden eggs, so they didn't really have much of a choice. It was hard to tell the time with no view of the outside world, but what was easy to tell is that they were all extremely tired and collectively decided to find a safe spot to get some sleep.

With how dark it was Kasper couldn't exactly make out the features of the person approaching, but by his posture, the still somewhat lingering smell of alcohol, and because he suspected Flynn and Alastyr were probably already asleep, he was fairly certain that it was Kroe. He sat next to Kasper with a silent exhale.

"How's your arm?" the hobgoblin asked, pointing to the bandages on his friend's right forearm. He got scratched pretty badly by a giant bat blocking their way a few turns of the labyrinth before.

"It's fine" Kasper shrugged his shoulders "Nothing I can't handle"

They sat in silence for a while, staring into the overwhelming darkness all around them.

"I wanted to apologize" Kroe finally spoke.

"For what?" Kasper tried to play dumb. He didn't want to let it show that what happened actually bothered him. 

"You know what I'm talking about" he immediately saw through the facade "I'm sorry for the dumb shit I said when I was drunk"

"Ohh, you mean the Strangle thing?" even though he knew Kroe wasn't buying it, he still tried to keep up the act "Don't worry about it. I know it was just a dumb joke, I just got angry because I was... you know" Kasper made a very ambiguous hand motion in the air to avoid explaining himself. Kroe nodded his head in response.

"Still" he put his hands behind his head and leaned against the wall, half sitting, half laying down "I feel like I owe you something, so... how about some advice?"

"Advice?" Kasper chortled under his breath "What, like life advice? I think I'm good in that department, thank you very much"

"I meant love advice"

Kasper froze for a second. Fortunately for him, the darkness concealed his flustered expression.

"W-why would I need love advice? What are we in middle school? You're gonna help me write a letter to my crush? Which I do not have, by the way" he was talking fast, stumbling over his words. Kroe rolled his eyes.

"Kasper, come on" it was too dark to make out his expression, but Kasper could very clearly imagine the kind of smug smile he had on his face "I know you like him, you know you like him, there's no point in trying to deny it. And I wanna help you, cause it doesn't seem like you're trying to go anywhere with this. Unless, you know, blushing and stuttering every time he does something remotely nice counts"

"Hey, I don't do that!" he exclaimed, and in that moment he realized that he just confirmed every single thing Kroe said. He paused for a few seconds evaluating his options before continuing "Okay, I admit, I may have a little bit of a crush on Strangle. He's a cool guy, okay? I like him" he looked to the side "And yeah, I have no idea what to do about it"

Kasper felt his friend gently bump his shoulder with his fist.

"Tell him!"

"That's your advice?!" he heard Kroe chuckle silently.

"Well, yes and no" the smile could still be heard in his voice "I can tell you're not that great at talking about your feelings, so maybe I could help you with that? Just pretend I'm Strangle and- wait, no, that's a little weird" Kasper nodded in agreement "Maybe just say something nice to me? I feel like confessing platonic feelings might be a good first step" Kroe stared at his friend for a moment as he collected his thoughts in his head. 

Kasper wasn't really sure about this whole thing. First of all, he was still processing the information that his feelings for Strangle were so apparent even Kroe noticed them. How obvious was he being? Certainly not t h a t obvious... right? Second of all, he now also had to tell his friend how he felt about him. It wasn't as serious or stressful as a love confession, but for Kasper it still wasn't an easy thing to do.

"Kroe..." he started slowly, choosing his words carefully, nervous to get it right "I think... you're a great guy. I... really appreciate that you're helping me with this. It's really... thoughtful and, uh... selfless of you. Thank you"

"No problem. Keep going"

"Keep going?" he sighed "I already said so much!"

"It needs to come from your heart! You just thanked me for helping you, that's not 'so much'. Keep going" 

Kasper rolled his eyes. But then he got thinking. How d i d he feel about Kroe? What were the things he actually liked and respected about him? He went silent for a few more seconds.

"Well... I think you're actually really, really brave. I've been in quite a few battles with you by now, and I really admire how, you know... strong you are, not just physically, but in the sense that you... protect other people" Kasper put his hand on Kroe's shoulder "When you killed Spidbur, and we were able to get out just in time to save Alastyr? I know it's a cliché, but I really think we couldn't have done it without you. And I... I really care about that kid. So, from the bottom of my heart: thank you"

Kroe stayed silent for a second, then whispered out:

"Dude, do you want like a hug or something? That was great!" Kasper chuckled quietly.

"Yeah, yeah I could go for one. You're welcome, by the way"

"Oh I am so welcome!" he said as his friend sat up to hug him "You actually got me teared up there for a second, I never knew you had it in ya!"

"Stop, or I take it all back" Kasper exhaled through his nose in a silent laugh as he pulled away from the embrace.

"That wasn't so hard, right? Now you just gotta do the same thing, but with Strangle"

"Nooo, no no no no no" he shook his head "That's way different"

"Come on, it's similar enough"

"I know I might've said some nice things" Kasper smiled sarcastically "But I don't feel t h a t strongly about you, Kroe" he got another light punch in the shoulder in response.

"I know, I know. Did it at least help a little bit?" 

"Yeah, yeah I think it did"

"Good" Kroe stopped for a second to yawn "Well, I think I'm gonna go to sleep now. Maybe tomorrow you can practice on Alastyr, say something nice to him?" Kasper shook his head again.

"That might be even harder than telling Strangle I lo- like him a lot. I don't wanna get all soft on the kid, he might start thinking I care or something"

"That'd be disastrous" Kroe laid down next to Kasper and turned his back to him "Well, good night"

"Good night, Kroe" 


	4. Tragic backstories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kasper and Strangle look at the stars and talk about their pasts.

Although he probably wouldn't want to admit it, Kasper really enjoyed the state traveling through the portals put him in. He couldn't tell which way was up and down, he was flailing around in a colorful void, it felt like his stomach was spinning, but in a good way. The feeling of being in between realities, worlds, memories, maybe even between life and death, was also an interesting one. It made him feel as if he was either on the verge of remembering everything he ever forgot, or about to lose all of his remaining memories for good. There was something oddly alluring about that that Kasper liked.

He then felt the less pleasant and not quite as familiar feeling of getting pulled, instead of going all the way and traveling to the other side the party fell out of the hole in reality and into the Stranglehold. The force of the pull caused Kroe to drop one of the five golden eggs he was holding in his hands and it rolled on to the floor and to the other side of the room. He quickly ran up to it and put it back into his arms.

"I bet Strangle will be happy to see those huh?" Alastyr readjusted his belt and gestured to the eggs with his elbow "And to see us, of course"

They all made their way through the hallway and into the main room of the ship. Almost at the exact time they walked in, Strangle had just descended down the stairs with an empty can of Monster in his hand. He smiled upon seeing the party.

"Strangle! We got the eggs" Kroe lifted the eggs up a little bit higher into the air, almost dropping them again.

"That's great!" Strangle squeezed the empty can in his hand and tossed it into the garbage can "How'd it go?"

"Oh, oh!" Alastyr's eyes instantly lit up "We ended up in a city by a beach, it was hot and there were a lot of parties and drunk people, and then this homeless guy told us where the eggs were, and he gave us alcohol and Kroe drank it all, and we went to this basement, and it wasn't a basement because it was a maze..." he started recounting all of the events that took place and challenges they had faced in the labyrinth "...and then the eggs were there, and there was one more, and there was this vampire, but we killed him, and now we're here!" he finished, completely out of breath.

"Sounds like one hell of an adventure" Strangle gave him a smile "You guys must be exhausted"

"It was" Alastyr pause to yawn "And we are. I think I'm gonna go to sleep right away"

He started heading upstairs, and Flynn and Kroe followed, making jokes between each other and references to their recent adventure.

Strangle's gaze moved over to Kasper.

"Well, welcome back" he smiled at him.

"Yeah, hi" Kasper returned the smile "How have you been? Are you feeling better?"

"Much better, actually" Strangle took a seat on the couch and gestured for Kasper to sit next to him "And I've been alright, mostly resting. I really took your advice to heart, you know"

"Good, that's good" Kasper sat down on the couch, putting his feet up on it and leaning on the armrest.

Strangle definitely looked much healthier. His nose returned back to its regular color, his eyes once again sparkling with eagerness and he seemed generally more energetic, though that might've just been the Monster.

Kasper rubbed his eyes and let out a small yawn.

"Are you tired?" he got a question from the other side of the couch.

"Yeah, a little bit" he responded "It's been a long two days, both of them exhausting in different ways. First we were in this beach town with a bunch of sweaty party people, it was so loud and smelled disgusting, then that maze..." Kasper waved his hand dismissively "I'm just glad I finally get to get some rest. I wish I could lay down here but then I'd have to ask you to move somewhere else, and you know, it's your place, I don't really wanna tell you to go..." he started stumbling over his words, over explaining his reasoning.

"Hm, I mean..." Strangle picked up a small remote control from the coffee table and pressed a button on it, causing the couch to unfold into a medium sized bed "How about this?"

"Ooooh" Kasper laid down on the couch, which has now turned into a bed, with an impressed look on his face "That's pretty cool"

"If you think that's cool..." Strangle also laid down, two or three feet away from him "...then check this out"

He pressed another button, dimming the lights in the room to only a faint glow, and then another one, causing the metal plates on the ceiling to move, revealing there to be glass underneath them, and behind the glass: stars. Stars unlike on any night sky Kasper had ever seen before in his life. He's noticed the impressive view from the Stranglehold before, but this, having the stars above you stretch out for god knows how far, and on top of that laying next to Strangle as he watched them... this was something else.

"Whoa" was all he managed to say.

"Whoa indeed"

They laid like this for a few moments, taking in the view and each other's company, before Kasper broke the silence:

"Do you know any constellations?" he asked, not taking his eyes off of the night sky.

"I do, just not the ones here"

"'Not the ones here'? What, are there like different ones everywhere?"

"Well, stars are seen differently from every planet. And from many of them you can't even see the same ones" Strangle explained.

"Oh. Yeah, that makes sense" that was a dumb question, he thought to himself. He's gonna think I'm dumb now. Goddamit.

"I only know the ones you could see from my world, and some of the ones you could see from yours, but I haven't really found anything on any of the ones here. I think we might be the first ones to see this side of the universe"

"You know what that means?" Kasper gave him a smirk "That means we get to name them" Strangle's eyes instantly lit up.

"Okay then" he said, pointing at the sky "You see these four real bright ones, and three smaller ones?" Kasper did not see them, but he nodded in agreement anyway "This is the Great Eagle"

"That's a good one"

"Thank you. Your turn"

"Hm... You see those, the ones that form a circle?" he made a circular motion in the air with his finger "This is the, uh... Circle. Circle of Doom"

Strangle laughed, but not in a mean way, not at Kasper. His laugh was really nice to listen to, and his face looked so genuinely happy, Kasper couldn't help but smile.

"Ok, alright" Strangle said, composing himself "So the one next to it..." he made a hand motion which kind of looked like a circle, but not quite "Is the Hexadecahedron. Of Doom" he laughed under his breath again. Clearly adding "of doom" at the end of names was really funny to him.

"Oh, that is so unfair!" Kasper ironically rolled his eyes "That's as if I called mine the Super Ultra Greater Than Yours Eagle"

"You can call the next one that"

"Maybe I will" he give him a smirk, which Strangle returned immediately. They laid in silence for a few more seconds, before Kasper once again asked:

"If you don't mind me asking... why are you not in your original world anymore? Like, the place where you're from. Why did you leave?"

Strangle's expression shifted instantly and he looked down at his hands.

"Oh... it kinda, uh, got destroyed. Overtaken, I guess would be a better word to use. Everything is more or less still there, it's just not really... livable anymore" Kasper took his gaze away from the stars to look over at him. "It got taken by the same creatures, the same shatters in reality that are now attacking your world. They came out of nowhere, just like they're doing now, but my world lacked people like you, Kasper. We stood no chance. And they defeated us. As far as I know, I'm the only one that survived. I'm yet to find anyone else that did" there was a few seconds of silence.

"Strangle, that's..." Kasper said quietly "That's awful, I'm so sorry that you had to go through that..."

He stared at the stars for a while before replying:

"It's fine, it's been a long time. I try not to think about it too much. But this is the main reason why I... do what I do. I wasn't able to save my world, and I know what the pain of losing it was like. So maybe I can at least save someone else's world. Help spare them that pain"

To say Kasper's respect for Strangle grew would be an understatement.

"That's... that's a really noble cause, Strangle. I'm... I'm sorry. I'm sorry that happened to you" he saw him rub one of his eyes a little.

"Well" he looked at him with a sad smile "the past is the past. And what about you, Kasper? Got any tragic backstories to share?"

"My tragic backstory" he looked back up at the sky and at this moment, he immediately felt so much more thankful for Kroe's 'talking about feelings' lessons. He felt like they might have to come in handy pretty soon "is that I don't know what my tragic backstory is"

"Oh?" Strangle asked curiously.

"I don't think I told you about this before, but I have amnesia. I don't really remember... much. And I'm continuously forgetting more. I keep a journal to remember, but it's not the same... Oh, and I have this photo" he took the photo of himself holding the hand of the dark haired girl and handed it to Strangle "I just kinda... had it on me. And I have no idea who that is.  She looks very different from me, so I don't think she's family. Definitely not a girlfriend, I'm... not really into that" Strangle nodded his head like that was common information he already knew and not a big reveal "Probably just a friend? I don't really have any other guesses" 

Strangle stared at the photo for a few seconds, then handed it back to Kasper.

"That whole 'forgetting everything instantly' thing is also part of why I was so sad about your death" he continued "I obviously would've been sad anyway, but the thought that I might someday completely forget you just because you weren't here..." he took a second to breathe "Yeah, that definitely made it worse"

"Shit, Kasper" Strangle's voice sounded genuinely concerned "I had no idea."

Kasper put the photo back into his pocket.

"It's fine, I'm dealing with it. I don't think this is something you ever really get used to, but I like to think that it gets easier, or better, or... something" Strangle nodded his head.

"Yep, pretty heavy stuff we have to deal with here" he looked down, than back at Kasper "What do you say we just hug it out for now, huh? Make it hurt a little less?"

"Y-yeah, seems like as good of an idea as any..."

Strangle opened his arms and Kasper scooted over closer. He wrapped his arms around him, and bringing his head close to his chest brought him in for a cuddle. Kasper could hear his heartbeat, feel the movement of his chest as he breathed in and out. For a second he felt Strangle's fingers barely grace his hair, as if he was about run them through it, but changed his mind last second.

"You know, Kasper..." he was speaking silently, but his voice still seemed loud so close to Kasper's ear "I don't know much about that memory stuff, and I can't really help you with what's already lost... But if you ever forget something that you think I might remember, don't hesitate to talk to me. I'll always remind you" he pulled him in even closer.

"Th-thank you..." was all Kasper could stammer.

"No problem"

They stayed like this for a couple of minutes, close together, arms wrapped around each other, knees and feet touching.

"Are you asleep?" he eventually heard Strangle whisper.

"No" he replied "But I'm gonna be soon. I'm pretty tired"

"Alright... I'll be leaving then...?"

No, was Kasper's immediate thought. He wanted him to stay. He wanted him to stay close all night, listen to his heart beat slowly as he fell asleep. He wanted to bring their hands together, fingers interlocked, make gentle little circles with his thumb on the others knuckles. He wanted to hold him as close as possible, play with his hair and stroke his cheek as they both drifted off, under the stars, in each other's arms...

He wanted him to stay.

But he couldn't say it.

"Yeah, sure" he replied.

"Okay" Strangle slowly let go of him and moved away, getting up from the bed. He pressed a button on the remote control, turning the lights off completely.

"Good night, Kasper" he said on his way out.

"Good night, Strangle" he replied, as he heard his footsteps going up the stairs.

Away from him.


	5. The diaphragm is a sheet of skeletal muscle, separating the thoracic cavity from the abdominal cavity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Dimension Dudes visit a new dimension,  
> Kasper learns how to use a bow, but regains little to no information,  
> Hey, that rhymed,  
> Unlike this line.

That night Kasper fell asleep pretty late. Even with how tired he was, he couldn't stop thinking about everything that he had just learned and all the happened recently. The saddest, most heartbreaking thought, the one that interrupted his sleep the most, was the one about Strangle's home world getting completely overtaken by the same mushroom creatures that were now attacking his own. I mean, at one point in his life, Strangle had lost literally everything, everyone he knew: his friends, family, maybe even someone particularly close to his heart, were all dead. He must've been so scared, Kasper thought, he must've felt so alone in this dark, never ending cosmos... He knew it was ridiculous to blame himself for not being there to help him in that time, but, to a degree, he still did it.

The thoughts eventually died down, letting Kasper fall asleep. When he woke up the next day, everyone else was already awake. He sat up on the unfolded couch, as usual taking a few seconds for everything that happened the day before to come back to him, for all his memories to set in. He stayed like this for a few seconds, listening to the sounds of talking and clinking of utensils against plates which were coming from the kitchen, and eventually he made his way there. 

"Good morning" Kasper said as he entered the room, hearing four other separate 'good mornings' in response "What are we having?"

"Eggs and toast" Strangle replied stirring the eggs in the pan, as two pieces of fresh hot bread popped out of the toaster.

"Oh, you're cooking again?" Kasper gave the rest of the party an annoyed look "You don't have to do that, the kids - and Kroe - need to learn to make food for themselves every once in a while!"

"It's fine, I don't mind it at all. I quite enjoy cooking, actually" he handed out a portion of eggs and toasted bread to everyone who didn't get it yet.

Kasper took a seat next to Alastyr and began to eat his food. 

"I wonder what the next world is going to be" the kid dangled his feet over the floor "Any guesses?"

"I just hope it's not as... smelly as the last one" Flynn bit into his toast "I had to wash my hair like three times yesterday and it still kinda smells like beer" he sniffed a strand of his hair "Yep, it still does"

"I hope it's all... future-y" Alastyr's eyes lit up "You know, like the nightmare world but without the nightmares. With tall buildings and cars, and, uh... whatever those smaller cars we ran away from the monsters on were called"

"Motorcycles?" Strangle immediately perked up. Alastyr nodded his head in response "You had a motorcycle chase?! That's so cool!"

"I KNOW!" he let go of his toast dropping it onto the plate "It was SO COOL! A real adventure!"

"Man, now I really wish I were there" Strangle finished his food and stood up to put the dirty dishes into the dishwasher "So, are we ready to go? Adventure waits for no one, ay, Alastyr?" he gave him a wink.

"Yeah!" the kid quickly swallowed the rest of his toast and rushed out the door.

Watching this scene unfold, Kasper couldn't have been more endeared. Even if he sometimes rolled his eyes at Alastyr's exceeding excitement, he always immediately got a soft spot for anyone making the boy feel special and like he was on an adventure, even when they were doing something mundane, like eating eggs and toast for breakfast. And when it was Strangle doing it? Kasper didn't let it show, but his heart was completely melted. 

Everyone made their way into the main room of the Stranglehold, readjusting their clothing, checking in their bags and pockets to see if they had everything they needed. When they were all ready, Kroe held up one of the eggs to his face and whispered:

"To get to the other side"

The party felt the familiar sensation of traveling through the portals, the colorful lights all around them, and finally - the light at the end of the tunnel, as they fell out of a hole in reality and rolled on the ground.

The sunlight was dimmed by grey clouds stretching as far as the eye could see. The ground they landed on was cold, but not hard - the fall didn't hurt them at all. The first thing Kasper felt as he got up was something tiny and freezing fall onto his nose. As he looked down, he noticed himself, all of his friends and the ground they were standing on were all covered in a thin layer of snow.

Strangle immediately jumped up.

"WHAT IS THAT?!" he exclaimed, trying to shake as much of it off of him as possible "Don't touch it with your bare hands! It might be dangerous!" the party looked at him slightly confused.

"Strangle, it's just snow" Alastyr kneeled down and picked up a handful, and showed it to his panicking friend "See? It's not dangerous" he lightly threw a very small amount of snow onto his own face, then chuckled.

"T h a t ' s snow?" Strangle looked around "So that's what it looks like... I've heard about it, but it hasn't been seen for decades in my world. It got too warm..." he leaned down and picked up some of it too, exhaling through his nose in a silent laugh as it slowly melted in his hand "It's cool. I like it"

"Guys, I think there's a town that way" Kroe pointed to a faint glow of lights on the horizon "Should we head down there?"

"I mean, it's the only real reference point we've got" Flynn said, looking around "I don't really see any other options"

Indeed, besides the lights pointed out by Kroe, the entire landscape seemed to be just empty snowy planes, with only a few occasional trees here and there. The party started making their way forward, towards the glow on the horizon. Strangle and Alastyr, later also joined by Kroe, were trying to catch snowflakes into their mouths all the way there to not much success. It wasn't snowing particularly hard. Kasper rolled his eyes at them a bunch, but in reality he found the scene charming. 

They reached the town after around twenty minutes. The candles in the street lamps were lit, making the streets much brighter then the rest of the desolate snowy planes around them. There were almost no people in the streets, most of them hiding from the cold in the comfort of their homes. 

Kroe pointed out a wooden sign atop one of the doors. The sign said in carved wooden letters: 'FOOD'. FOOD appeared to be a multidimensional chain restaurant the party grew quite attached to over their adventure so naturally, their first thought was to go in there.

Heading inside, there were only three people: two men in heavy winter coats, silently eating steaming soup from wooden bowls, and the bartender - a skinny man, probably in his thirties, of pale skin and with a brown ushanka on his head.

"Welcome to FOOD, what will you be having?" he put down the glass he was cleaning.

"We actually came here to ask a question..." Kasper leaned against the counter. This time he wanted to waste no time and jump straight to the case "Do you happen to know anything about a... golden egg? About yay big," he gestured how big the egg was "gold in color? Shiny?"

"And who hasn't?" the man scoffed "Those fuckin' bastards, they stole it from us. It was the only thing keeping us safe. And now it's all going downhill. We have the first bear attack in years, boars trampling and eating our crops... Without that egg we're nothin'" he angrily tossed the cloth he was previously using to clean the glass on the counter.

The party members looked at each other confused. What the hell was this guy on about? As far as they were concerned, the eggs provided no magical lucky force fields that blessed the bearers with good fortune. If that were true, they'd be rolling in good luck and never run into any trouble, and that was certainly not what was happening.

Kasper cleared his throat.

"Well... we... are here to help!" he took on a proud stance "That's right, we've heard about your problem and decided to give you a helping hand! Me and my crew here, the Dimension Dudes," he gestured to the party "will go to the enemy camp, take back what was once yours and bring it back to you!" 

"R-really?" the man's eyes lit up.

"Yes" Kasper nodded his head "All we'll need is your finest battle equipment, and uh... payment, for a job well done"

"Of course, of course!" the bartender ran out from behind the counter and gestured to the two men who were just finishing their soup "Hey, men! Get the axes and bows ready! This brave crew of adventurers is going to save Aedlish!"

They ran out the door with a hearty 'Hey!'. Kasper put on a smug smirk as he watched them leave, then turned to the party.

"Well, that was easy" 

"They must really want that egg back" Flynn agreed.

"But we can't give them that egg back!" Alastyr sounded concerned "We need to take it with us! Why did you tell them we're going to bring it back?!"

"Well, we won't give it to them of course!" Kasper scoffed "It doesn't actually protect them, they just think that it does. We'll just take it and leave, no harm done!"

"But they'll think we're liars!"

"And aren't we?"

"I don't want to be!" Alastyr crossed his arms. 

"Hey, I'm sure we'll figure something out, boy" Kroe patted him on the back.

"Yeah" Strangle agreed "We'll go with Kasper's plan for now, but if it's possible to eat the cake and have it too we'll do that, okay?" Alastyr looked at all of his party members.

"Okay..." he eventually complied "Only because it's for the greater good"

They exited out of FOOD and into the center of the village, where the townsfolk have already laid down an impressive assortment of weapons - mostly bows, crossbows and small battle axes. The familiar man in an ushanka rushed up to them. 

"Here is the battle equipment for you kind gentlemen! There's a shooting range if any of you wish to practice your skills before heading out" he gestured to a small hut on the other side of the village, then pointed to a slightly bigger building opposite to FOOD "And here's our inn if you wish to rest, free of charge, of course. We honestly cannot thank you enough. We do not have a lot of fighters and if we left our village unprotected, they'd attack it no doubt... You will bring peace and good fortune back to Aedlish!" all the other villagers cheered. Kasper had a wide smile on his face, clearly extremely proud of himself.

Every one of the party members chose their weapons. Strangle picked up a large wooden bow and weighed it in his hand.

"I think I'm gonna go try this baby out before we go. Anyone wanna come with me?"

"I'll go" Kasper volunteered, picking up a small crossbow "Need to... brush up on my aiming a little, y'know?"

"Oh, I wanna go too!" Alastyr waved his weapon around with no regard to safety. Some of the nearby villagers ducked instinctively. Kroe put his arm around him.

"No, kid, you need to, uh... help me with something"

"Help you with what?"

"Well, uh..." he leaned down to whisper something into Alastyr's ear and everyone saw his eyes open wider.

"Never mind that" he made an apologetic gesture towards Kasper and Strangle "I'm gonna go with Kroe! Maybe I'll join you later!" 

As they left you could hear a faint 'You really saw a furry toad there? Like a snow toad? With fur?' coming from Alastyr's mouth.

"If they're giving us free stuff then I think I'm gonna go ask the inn people for some shampoo. Maybe it'll get that awful smell out of my hair" Flynn attached a crossbow to his bag and began heading towards the inn "See you guys later"

"See you" 

Kasper and Strangle picked up their respective weapons of choice and headed towards the shooting range.

As they entered inside, the first thing they noticed is that it looked much bigger from the inside than the outside: there were four separate posts, each with a stand for a bow and arrows. Slightly busted targets were stuck onto bundles of hay and there were two wooden benches on opposite sides. The building looked old and a little worn out, clearly in need of some renovation.

Strangle stood at one of the posts, bow and arrow in hand, and gave Kasper a smirk.

"First time?"

"Huh?" 

"Is this the first time you're in a shooting range" he said, loading an arrow "or have you trained before?" 

"Oh. No, I don't think I've ever even used a bow. That's why I took the crossbow. Seems easier"

Strangle let go of the arrow and it came flying, missing the center of the target only by a few inches. He laughed under his breath, surprised at his own skill.

"That was great!" Kasper sounded genuinely impressed.

"Yeah, I'm better at this than I thought! I haven't used a bow in quite some time, I was afraid I might've gotten rusty, but I'm doing pretty well!" he fired another arrow, this time hitting the target almost perfectly "You said you've never used a bow before? Maybe I can teach you a little something? If you want, that is" he gave Kasper an alluring smile.

"O-oh, um, well..." despite the cold, he felt a wave of heat wash over him "If you want to..." 

Strangle handed him the bow and stepped away to let him stand at the post. Kasper loaded an arrow and got ready to take a shot. 

"Hmm... yeah, your stance is a little off. But that's okay, you've never done this before. Bring your hand up a little bit?"

"Like that?" Kasper followed his instruction.

"No, your other hand. A little more up. A little more- no no, down. Now the other hand- no wait, you moved it back down again. You need to keep it in place" he sighed quietly and took a step closer "You know what, this isn't really working... may I...?"

Kasper didn't exactly know what he was asking, but he nodded his head in agreement anyway. Strangle stepped behind him, out of his field of vision, and suddenly, he felt his hand touch his right elbow. The other hand made it's way to Kasper's left forearm, grabbing it gently. As he spoke, Kasper felt his hot breath on his ear, so different from the cold air surrounding them. 

"Alright, so you need to bring this hand up..." he lightly pushed Kasper's right elbow upwards.

"M-mhm" his heartbeat was getting quicker.

"The other hand..." Strangle slowly slid his hand up Kasper's forearm, gently moving it to the right and then up "Needs to go like that... Don't move the other one now, you keep doing that" he chuckled softly.

"Sorry..." his voice was almost a whisper.

"It's alright. Remember to always aim just a little bit higher then where you're planning to shoot. And if there's wind blowing from the right, you shoot a little bit more to the right, right?"

"Right"

"Right. And now, just focus on your breathing. Take a deep breath through your diaphragm..."

"My what?" Kasper genuinely could not tell if he actually didn't know what a diaphragm was, or if it was the current situation he was in that caused him to forget basic anatomy.

"Your diaphragm? It's a sheet of skeletal muscle, located right about..." Strangle took the hand previously resting on Kasper's right elbow, moving it up his arm and placing it just below the rib cage "...here"

Kasper's heart was definitely, under no circumstances supposed to be racing this fast. His breath was getting shaky, and his vision blurry, and not just because he wasn't wearing his glasses. Strangle's hand pressed a little bit more firmly against his torso, pulling him in closer.

"Now, the diaphragm" his voice was deep, but soft "is what separates the thoracic cavity, where your heart and lungs are, from the abdominal cavity. Basically it helps you breathe" whatever was happening right now certainly was not helping Kasper breathe. He couldn't concentrate on a single word Strangle was saying. 

"W-wow, you know so much about... diaphragms..." he was so out of it he didn't even notice how shitty of a flirt that was. Fortunately, Strangle didn't either.

"Yeah, I know a little something..." Kasper could swear he just felt the tip of his nose brush up against his ear "Now, just take a deep breath in..." his voice was so warm, so soft... so sweet in his ear... what if he just put the bow down? What if he turned around? Put his right hand on the side of his neck... the left one on his cheek... He took a breath in. 

"And out..." what if he turned around, right now, just like that? What if he looked him in the eye? Put his nose up against Strangle's, whispered something back in the same soft, soft voice? One hand on his neck, the other on his cheek... He took a breath out. 

"You're doing great, Kasper..." 

What if he just did it? 

...What if he just kissed him...?

But he took too long to decide. There were too many 'what ifs' running through his head all at once, and he didn't know the answer to any of them. He took too long to make up his mind, and the moment was gone.

Strangle removed both his hands and stepped away.

"Okay, try shooting" his voice turned back to it's regular volume. 

Kasper took a moment to compose himself, his heart gradually slowing down, his breath going back to normal. 

He let go off the arrow and it imbed itself just next to the target, not even an inch to the left and he would've hit it. 

"Hm. Not bad for a first time" Strangle gave him a smile.

"Yeah" Kasper put the bow down "Barely missed it"


	6. A song stopped abruptly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The villagers throw a party for the party, during which Kasper gets a chance to shoot his shot. Will he take it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just popping in to say writing this has been genuinely therapeutic to me so far (this chapter is my favorite one yet get hyped), i'm having a good time doing it and i hope you're having a good time reading it as well! i think it's going to be 10 parts + the epilogue so there's still some cool stuff left don't you worry

The wind was getting worse, blowing hair and snow into Kasper's eyes, making it hard to see. It's not like there was much to see in front of him anyway, it was just empty snowy fields, and the very, very distant lights of the village of Aedlish. But behind him there was a small, but very angry group of creatures he's never seen before. They looked similar to what Kroe probably would look like if he was covered in white fur, and a bit smaller. They were only about 5'2", but surprisingly strong and feisty. And they really did not want to give them that egg.

Flynn fired a crossbow at the knee of one of the creatures that was almost catching up to him, causing it to fall, but it still managed to get a hold of his left foot and trip him.

"GENIE?!" the halfling exclaimed in fear as the creature started to pull him in closer, getting ready to slice him with a sickle "A LITTLE HELP PLEASE?!"

Geruda popped out of the bottle in a puff of air and gracefully spun around before firing a blast of unnaturally strong and fast wind current right at the creature. It laid unmoving. 

"Thank me later, kid" he popped back inside the bottle.

"Thank you!" Flynn got up and brushed some snow off of himself.

"I said thank me later!"

Another one of the creatures tried to tackle Strangle, but before it could even touch him, he turned around swiftly kicking it right in the center of the chest, knocking it off its feet. It fell on its back and before it could get up, he stepped on its rib cage with his large boot, preventing it from moving. He then took out one of the arrows and with a single confident move imbed it right in the eyeball. Blood splattered on the snow. Kasper found the scene oddly attractive.

There was only one enemy left, and it was going for Alastyr. He was running pretty quickly, but it jumped to him with immense speed and managed to reach him with its sickle, creating a cut in his left shoulder. Alastyr let out a scream and stumbled, almost falling over. In that moment, Kroe and Kasper simultaneously attacked, Kroe with a battle axe, and Kasper with his crossbow. The bolt hit right in the shoulder and the creature stopped, preparing to run over to Kasper next, but before it could make a move, it already had an axe stuck in the spine. The fight was over.

Everyone ran up to Alastyr, who was now kneeling on the ground, his face scrunched up in pain, holding on to his shoulder.

"Alastyr" Kasper kneeled down next to him "Are you okay?"

"N-no..." he took his hand off the wound, and closed his eyes upon seeing how much blood was on it "It hurts..."

"Hang on" Strangle made a tear in Alastyr's clothing to access the cut easier. He took some cloth out and began to dress the wound. 

"Who's got the egg?" Kasper looked up at Kroe and Flynn. The first one took the egg out from inside his coat and showed it to Kasper.

"It's right here"

"Good, good" he said, and upon seeing Alastyr furrow his brow in pain again added "Hey, it'll be over soon kid. And you're gonna have a pretty sick scar"

Strangle finished bandaging the cut and gave the wounded a hand to help him stand.

"Can you walk right away? Or would you rather wait?" he asked, helping him keep his balance.

"Y-yeah I can walk. I don't think it'll make much of a difference"

"Okay then. Let's go"

"Wait" Kasper stopped them "We don't have a fake egg to give them, we can't go back!"

Everyone else paused and looked at each other. He was right. The townsfolk needed the golden egg to protect their village - or at least they were convinced that they did. But they couldn't just give it to them, they needed it for a different, much more real cause.

"Hm, maybe... uh, Kasper?" Strangle turned to face him "You know magic and stuff, right? Can you make like a fake magic egg and give them that instead?"

"I can, but it won't last forever..." he replied, scratching himself under the chin "And if they try to touch it they'll know it's not real. I say we bail. We go home right now"

"No!" Alastyr sounded genuinely mad "We can't just lie to them! We're supposed to be heroes! We're the good guys!"

"Listen, kid" Kasper put an arm around him "There is no 'good' and 'bad' guys, there is no 'heroes' and 'villains', we just... do stuff, sometimes bad and sometimes good. And right now, we just have to do something bad"

"Well I don't wanna do something bad!" he broke free of the embrace "We're going back there and we're... uh, well, I don't know what we're doing exactly, but we'll figure it out! We're not leaving them like this. Our world is not the only one worth saving, Kasper"

There was a few seconds of silence as they stared at each other, the wind blowing their hair in their faces. Eventually Kasper turned to the rest of the party.

"Well...?" he waited for them to respond.

"Well..." Flynn spoke up first "I say we go back. If things go super terribly wrong and we really gotta go, we'll still have the egg to get out, right? I mean, we're not leaving without it"

"I agree" Kroe joined in "If it's this important for Alastyr, we'll figure something out. Plus, they haven't paid us yet" 

Strangle just nodded his head. Kasper looked around at all of them.

"Alright then" he finally spoke "Let's go. But I am not helping you make a silly fake egg to trick the villagers into thinking they have good luck"

They started slowly heading towards Aedlish. The wind blowing snow right in their faces was definitely not helping, and they were still quite tired from the battle, so getting back to the village took them a fair amount of time. When they eventually made their way there, there were already villagers eagerly waiting. They erupted in cheer upon seeing the party.

"So? Did you get it? Is it here?" the familiar bartender in a brown ushanka sounded hopeful. 

"Well..." Kasper was tempted to say 'no'. It would've been so much easier to just say they didn't have it and leave, no matter what the other guys said "We-"

"We did!" Kroe interrupted him, pulling out the egg. The villagers cheered once more, louder this time, some of them began dancing.

"Oh, oh, how wonderful!" the bartender took the egg out of Kroe's hands before Kasper could protest "A celebration is due! Yes, yes, come! We will dance and eat! Food and beverages free of charge for you kind sirs, of course, of course! And if you wish to stay the night, the inn is also free of charge! Of course!"

They practically got pulled into 'FOOD', where some of the townspeople already began setting the tables aside, creating a small stage out of them for the musicians to play on.

Kasper punched Kroe in the arm.

"Why did you give them the egg right away?!"

"Yeah, what the hell man!" Flynn also sounded pretty mad "We didn't agree on this!"

"We didn't agree on anything!" Kroe massaged his bruised arm "We just said we were gonna roll with it and come up with a plan later! Besides," he gestured at musicians getting on the stage and at the food and drinks which were currently being brought out of the kitchen "Now we get a party! A party just for us! So excuse me, because I am going to go and enjoy it" he walked off to the snacks table.

"Can you believe this guy?" Flynn gestured at Kroe with a disgusted expression. Kasper shook his head in response.

"Well, there isn't much we can do about it now" Alastyr joined in the conversation "I think he's right, let's just enjoy the party! We get free food and drinks after all!" he ran off to catch up with Kroe.

The remaining three party members stayed near the door.

"So? What's the plan?" Kasper turned to Flynn and Strangle.

"I hate to disagree with you like this, but maybe we really should just make the best of what we've got?" Strangle looked at Kasper a little bit nervously "I mean, it is a party for us, they got a point there. And the egg isn't going anywhere, in fact it's easier to get than all the other previous times. Those people obviously can't guard it very well. So whatever you two wanna do I won't stop you, but I'm going to go get a drink, ok?" he gave them a smile and then walked off to the bar.

Kasper and Flynn looked at each other. The second one shrugged his shoulders, waved his hand dismissively, clearly deciding to just comply and go along with it for now, and went to join Kroe and Alastyr, who were now having what looked like a potato soup eating contest. Kasper just leaned against the doorframe and crossed his arms, looking at everyone in the bar slightly annoyed.

The music began to play and almost everyone immediately started dancing, some people in pairs and some alone. The tune was generally upbeat, but not too quick. Kasper involuntarily started tapping his foot along to it.

Alastyr seemed to be done with his soup eating contest and was now talking to a girl of light brown skin and frizzy black hair, about his age, but slightly taller than him. He was showing her the dressed wound on his shoulder, undoubtedly trying to impress her with an epic story of his injury. It seemed to be working pretty well. Strangle was having a drink and chatting on and off with the bartender, and Kroe and Flynn seemed to be talking between each other while picking up some more food to snack on from the tables. 

Some time has passed of Kasper just standing leaned against the wall, mindlessly looking into the space before him, when he noticed Kroe walking up.

"What's up?" he said, still slightly annoyed. Kroe just nudged him lightly, then gestured to Strangle with his head.

"Go ask him to dance"

"What?!" startled by this unexpected suggestion Kasper punched him in the arm again, this time not as hard "No!"

"Why not? It's the perfect opportunity!" Kroe leaned against the wall next to him "You're not gonna get another chance like this. Have you been shooting your shot at all the last few days? Because I doubt you have"

"Things have been happening!" Kasper thought back to the bow lessons and stargazing on the couch "They may or may not have not been initiated by me at all, but still. They've been happening"

"Mhm. What don't you make another thing happen and go dance with him then?"

"Because...!"

"Because what?" Kroe looked at him for a few seconds without getting a response "Yeah, that's what I thought. Go. Go do it. I'll be rooting for you" he patted him on the shoulder and began to exit the building, gesturing for Flynn to go with him.

"And where are you going?"

"To get the egg back"

"So suddenly you care about the egg? You didn't even ask if I wanted to come!" Kasper began to sound annoyed again.

"Because I know you don't. You wanna go dance with Strangle" Kroe gave him a smile and a wink as he left through the heavy door. Flynn followed behind a few seconds after, waving goodbye to Kasper.

He turned around with an angry face, but then he saw Strangle, standing at the bar, just finishing his drink, and his expression immediately softened. Strangle noticed him too and smiled from across the room. Kroe was right. This was the perfect opportunity. He wasn't going to get another chance like this. 

Kasper took a deep breath. The exhale was a little bit shaky, as he began slowly heading towards Strangle. Time seemed to slow down, the people dancing around him were moving in slow motion. One of the dancing couples he noticed were Alastyr and the curly haired girl he was talking to earlier. The kid had a big smile on his face and blush on his cheeks. If even Alastyr could do it, then Kasper could do it too, right? ...Right?

After what felt like forever, he finally reached the bar and leaned against it next to Strangle.

"Hi" Kasper already felt out of breath.

"Hi" he responded, putting down his glass "Are you enjoying the party?"

"Yeah, it's nice, it's nice" he pointed to the dance floor "There's people dancing"

"There... sure is" Strangle agreed.

"Are you... planning on dancing as well?"

"I was" he gave him a look "But I didn't wanna go alone" 

"Hm" Kasper felt himself blushing again. Stop, he thought to himself. Stop blushing, stop blushing, stop fucking blushing, Kasper "Y-yeah, same" why was he so nervous? This was nothing, nothing was happening, and he was so nervous. 

He tucked a strand of hair behind his ear, and took one more deep breath, this time less shaky. He looked at Strangle and extended his hand towards him.

"Do you... wanna dance with me?"

"Sure" Strangle smiled and took his hand, leading him to the dance floor.

The entire way there Kasper kept staring at their hands, locked together. He was in absolute disbelief that this was happening. 

Strangle stopped upon finding an empty spot. He turned around to face Kasper, raising his hand that he was holding upwards and putting his other one on Kasper's waist. Kasper put his hand on Strangle's shoulder, they got half a step closer to each other, and then just... stopped. Strangle looked around the room a little bit nervously, then leaned in to say:

"Probably not the best time to say I have absolutely no idea how to dance" he chuckled under his breath. 

"Yeah, yeah me neither" Kasper responded with the same silent laugh "Maybe just... do what everyone else is doing?"

They both awkwardly looked around the room. Having not learned much, Strangle just shrugged his shoulder.

"You know, let's just start, maybe it'll get easier with time. I'll lead" he moved his hand a little bit further towards Kasper's lower back, bringing him in closer and then, after spinning both him and himself around once, he started dancing in a circular pattern, which Kasper quickly picked up on. At first they kept bumping into the couple next to them, a man and a woman both dressed surprisingly posh for a small village like this, who kept scoffing at them and giving them weird looks. Soon enough, Kasper and Strangle came up with a new pattern that didn't bother anyone. Kasper looked down at their feet, then back towards Strangle's face.

"Huh, not bad" he smiled "Not bad at all"

"See?" he let go of Kasper's waist for a second to spin him around under his arm, then grabbed a hold of him once more and tipped him back slightly "I told you it gets easier"

"And you were right" Kasper took the lead for a second to change the direction they were facing, careful not to bother the uptight couple again "We're getting pretty good at this, huh?"

"We make a good pair" Strangle smiled at him warmly. Kasper returned the smile.

They kept dancing for a few more minutes, gradually getting closer to each other, half subconsciously, half on purpose. The dancing was admittedly starting to get a little tiring, but none of them really wanted to stop. 

After some time, the music started changing rhythm, and as every one of the lone dancers and approximately half of the couples (including the posh couple, as well as Alastyr and his new friend - those two went back to the tables for some chicken breast) the music changed tune and slowed down completely, turning into every middle schooler's worst nightmare - the slow dance. Every one of the remaining couples stepped closer to each other, slowing down, some with eyes closed, hands on backs and necks. 

And Kasper and Strangle completely froze. 

Looking into each other's eyes, standing completely still, unmoving, Kasper noticed Strangle's face getting very slightly, almost unnoticeably red. This time, he was the one to make the first move. He turned the hand Strangle was holding slightly, interlocking their fingers together and stepped just a little bit closer. Strangle took the hint, moving his hand further up Kasper's back, bringing him in really, really close, their chests were now barely touching. Kasper looked down, too nervous to look him in the eye again, and slowly, slowly placed his head on Strangle's shoulder, facing his neck. Strangle leaned his head on Kasper's, his cheek touching his forehead. 

And they began to dance. 

Very, very slowly, almost as if they were afraid that a single sudden movement may break the spell and tear them apart. Kasper, at first tense and nervous about the situation, had completely relaxed, letting his head go completely limp and rest on Strangle's shoulder. His eyes were half open, he was focusing his gaze on their interlocked hands. He started making gentle little circles with his thumb on Strangle's knuckles. He felt safe like this. He felt calm. He felt warm. He felt home. 

Kasper closed his eyes completely, his face now so close to Strangle's neck that his nose was almost touching it. The song was still playing, not yet showing signs of ending any time soon. Good, Kasper thought. He didn't want it to end.

But eventually, even with how slow it was, it began to slow down ever more. Gradually, the band played fewer and fewer chords, with longer breaks in between them, signifying the end of the song. Kasper sighed quietly. He didn't want it to end.

He felt Strangle's head turn slowly to the right, his nose brushed up against Kasper's hair. 

And he felt him plant a kiss on his forehead. 

Kasper's eyes immediately widened, he picked his head up from Strangle's shoulder to discover him looking directly at him, with eyes half-lidded, a soft smile, and with such kind, such tender, such loving gaze. 

This is it. He isn't going to get another chance like this. Go. Go do it.

Kasper picked his head further up to meet Strangles height, foreheads and noses touching, as he glanced over at his lips and closed his eyes, the song played it's final chords...

And suddenly everyone heard the crash of heavy wooden doors to the bar open with unforeseen force, hitting the wall, almost flying off. Everyone jumped, including Kasper and Strangle, who both opened their eyes and moved their faces away from each other, extremely startled, and extremely red. Kroe came running into 'FOOD' with the golden egg in hand, Flynn was just a few steps behind him, and even more in the back: a group of angry villagers chasing after them.

"KASPER, STRANGLE, ALASTYR!!! GO, GO, GO!" Kroe yelled, knocking over a few people on the way. He picked the golden artifact up to his face "TO GET TO THE OTHER SIDE, TO GET TO THE OTHER SIDE!!!"

A portal opened before them, and Kroe, practically grabbing and pulling along every one of his friends on the way, jumped inside at incredibly high speed. Alastyr opened his mouth in an attempt to say something to the curly haired girl, but before he could, he was already flying in the colorful cosmos, along with the rest of the party.

The last thing they heard before leaving Aedlish for good was the furious and desperate screams of the man in the ushanka. Aside from the egg, the only payment they received was a pitchfork one of the villagers managed to throw at them, which was currently floating with them inside the portal, traveling through reality, back to the Stranglehold.


	7. How to read a palm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Don't you ever wish someone would just take your hand and tenderly trace their finger along the lines on your palm, making silly little predictions about your future? Cause Kasper sure does.

They fell out of the portal with a force like never before. It's a good thing Kroe was keeping such a tight grip on the egg. He was basically curled up in a fetal position protecting it with his body from all sides as they came literally flying out of the portal, hitting the walls and floor of the Stranglehold, bruising everything there was to bruise. 

As they all slowly began to collect themselves, Kasper blew some hair out of his face, reaching his hand out to Alastyr to help him up. 

"Kroe, what the heck!" the kid did not look happy "First of all, I didn't get to say goodbye to Sue! Second of all: we did not agree on stealing the egg! You didn't tell me anything!"

"Again, Alastyr" Kroe was breathing heavily, evidently still tired "We did not agree on anything. There was no plan, everything was up in the air, and I was tired of Kasper being grumpy because we wanted to be good people" he gave him a sarcastic smirk "So I just decided to go for it, I grabbed Flynn and then we grabbed the egg, and then I grabbed you guys and now we're here!"

"Maybe you should've done less grabbing and more asking!" Alastyr walked up to him and poked him in the chest with his finger.

"What would you say to us if we asked?!" Flynn joined in the conversation "You would just tell us 'don't do it' without providing a solution of your own!"

"You still should've said something! We could've thought of a plan and executed it the next day!"

"We don't have time for that!" Kasper put his hand on Alastyr's shoulder "Look, kid, I understand you're upset, but sometimes we've gotta make sacrifices! We can't make everyone happy!"

"Well... I'm still upset!" he pushed Kasper's hand off "You should've talked to me before! And" he pointed at Kroe again "You made me miss my shot with Sue!" 

And my shot with Strangle, Kasper thought. He was never as close as he was just then, they were literally about to kiss. And now the moment was gone again, just like all the other times, and he had to wait for it to come back. Now that he knew he actually had a shot at getting together with Strangle, he realized how badly he wanted to just be with him already and how awfully tired he was of dancing around this whole thing. 

They all watched Alastyr storm out of the room, through the hallway and into the main area of the Stranglehold. The remaining party members looked around at each other. Kroe shrugged his shoulders.

"I know it's kind of an asshole move" he said "But I say just let him sort it out by himself, feel what he needs to feel, whatever. I'm like, really, really tired, and everything hurts, I can't deal with him right now"

"Me neither" Kasper rubbed his eyes "This whole saving the world thing is great, but you barely ever get a break. I think I need to lay down"

"Yeah, me too" Strangle agreed. Flynn just nodded his head along with everyone. 

Everyone made their way into the main room, Kroe and Flynn immediately headed up the stairs, while Kasper and Strangle stayed a little bit behind.

There was a few seconds of awkward silence between them, before Strangle said:

"So, uh... wanna name some more constellations?" Kasper gave him a smile.

"Sure" he headed over to the couch and sat down.

Strangle walked up to the coffee table to grab the remote control. After a few seconds of scanning the area, his expression changed to a slightly more confused one.

"That's weird" he said, still looking around the place "It's not here. I remember leaving it right here last time"

"Maybe it fell under the couch?" Kasper leaned down to look at the floor "Nope, not there. Strange"

"Yeah... well, um, maybe let's just sit then... I could've sworn I left it... you know what, whatever" Strangle waved his hand dismissively "I'm sure I'll find it later" he dimmed the lights manually, then took a seat next to Kasper, who was sitting cross legged on the couch, with one hand on the arm rest. 

"I'm dead tired" he said "I don't even know why, it's not like we did more than we usually do. Maybe I'm getting old" he laughed under his breath.

"You're telling me..." Strangle sighed "I'vejust turned twenty-seven like two months ago. Never felt so old" 

"I'm twenty-eight" 

"Oh. Really?" he looked at Kasper almost impressed "You look m a y b e twenty-five. On a bad day" 

"I don't think you've seen me on a bad day yet." he laughed silently "On a really shitty one I'd probably look thirty"

"God, thirty..." Strangle leaned his head on the headrest "Can you believe we're closer to thirty than twenty?"

"I'm closer to thirty than twenty-five" 

Strangle mindlessly looked at the stars for a few seconds.

"I used to think I'll have it all figured out by the time I'm thirty. And now I've got only three years left and I'm still nowhere near"

"Hey, you've still got three years left" Kasper smiled encouragingly "And besides, what do you mean you don't have it all figured out? You're saving the world! And you have a base in space!"

"Yeah, yeah..." Strangle nodded "But that's not all there is to it, I also have some... internal stuff going on that I've been trying to get myself to sort out, and I don't know when I'll get around to it, if ever. And I love the Stranglehold, don't get me wrong. Space is great. Never, ever in my life had I thought I'd live in space. But space gets, you know... lonely. And the lack of visible passage of time in here? That fucks with you more than you'd think. I keep a calendar..." he squinted his eyes, looking in the direction of a faintly visible square on the wall "Eh, I can't even see it right now. Too dark. Wish I had the remote"

"Oh, I can just..." Kasper snapped his fingers creating a few small orbs of light, then with a gesture forced them to fly over to the calendar, illuminating it, showing today's date - March 25th. 

"Oh, yeah. I forget you can do that" the lights refracting off of Strangle's eyes disappeared with another snap "We didn't have magic in my world"

"Really?" Kasper was very surprised "None at all?"

"None at all. I mean, we had fake magic - illusion. People would put on shows where they'd do tricks that looked like magic but weren't actually magic" he explained.

"And others believed that?" 

"No, they knew it was fake. But it still looked cool so they wanted to see it" Kasper looked even more confused "The real scammers were the people who would pretend to read your future and stuff. They were frauds, but some people still went to them for advice and such"

"How'd they get away with this? I mean, if their future predictions didn't come true people would surely realize, right?"

"They made them really vague, like they'd read your palm, tell you big things are coming, blah blah blah" Strangle rolled his eyes.

"How do you read a palm? Your world sounds weird, Strangle" Kasper chuckled.

"You know, you just..." Strangle picked up one of Kasper's hands with his hand "You see those little lines on your palms? Some people believe they mean stuff"

"Like w-what stuff?" Strangle's hand was so warm...

"I don't know. That's actually one of the few things I've never learned anything about"

"Maybe you can make it up? Like, pretend to read my palm? That'd be funny, I-I think..." Kasper knew it would not be funny at all. But he wanted Strangle to keep holding his hand like this.

"Well..." Strangle traced his finger along one of the lines on Kasper's palm, sending a tingle up his arm "This one means... you're going to live a long life. Yep, you're not dying anytime soon"

"Really?"

"No, I'm making it up" Strangle laughed.

"Oh, come on" Kasper squinted his eyes and smirked "You're breaking my immersion. Keep going"

"This one... hm... there's a big change coming to your life. Yeah, something is going to change. And it's gonna be big"

"Mmm. And that one?" Kasper pointed to a fold right on the center of his palm.

"Oh, this one..." Strangle slowly traced his finger along it "It means you're going to find love real soon"

"...Oh? H-how soon?"

"Sooner than you think" Strangle kept tracing his finger up and down the line.

Kasper picked up his gaze from his palm to Strangle's face. They were sitting pretty close together... Maybe he could...?

Strangle picked his head up and looked Kasper in the eye, he felt more fingers move across his palm and come in between his fingers, locking their hands together. Kasper looked down at them, then back into Strangle's eyes. He seemed to have gotten closer.

And Kasper went for it.

Their lips connected, not for very long, but it was enough. Kasper felt himself starting to get warm, not only in the face, but in his chest and stomach as well. Strangle's lips were soft, surprisingly soft. Maybe that's just how everyone's lips were, Kasper didn't have much frame of reference, but he knew one thing: they felt amazing.

After a few seconds Strangle pulled away to look at Kasper, his hazel eyes half open, face a little flushed. Two strands of his otherwise quite neatly arranged black hair were falling onto his face. Kasper went to tuck one of them behind Strangle's ear, to which he smiled, his eyes darting down for a second to look at Kasper's lips, then back to meet his gaze.

He looked beautiful. He looked so fucking beautiful.

Strangle put his hand under Kasper's chin, gently tipping it upwards, and went back to kiss him again, more passionately this time. His hand went up his jaw all the way to the back of his neck, he ran his fingers through Kasper's hair, the other hand still locked with his. Kasper's fingertips met Strangle's cheek, he stroked his face with his thumb, as he felt his lower lip be bitten gently. If Kasper's eyes were open right now, you'd see them roll back into his scull.

Strangle removed his hand from Kasper's hair and let go of his hand, grabbing him by the waist and lower back, tipping him backwards to lay him down on the couch, maybe a little bit too quickly. Kasper did not expect this, and with the weight of Strangle pushing down on him he fell backwards, hitting his head on the armrest, bringing him with him and bumping their foreheads together. They broke away from the kiss.

"Ow" Kasper massaged his forehead, and upon seeing Strangle's startled by the sudden fall expression, he started laughing. Strangle soon joined him, and they both laughed for a little bit too long, considering the situation wasn't extremely funny. 

When they were finished, previously laying on top of Kasper Strangle moved a little bit to the side, leaned his hand on the armrest and put the other one on top of Kasper's chest. 

"Listen, Kasper..." he looked down for a second, his fingers playing with the strings on Kasper's collar, his face slowly returning to its regular color "This has happened a few times before... I mean, not this exact thing, but you know what I mean: we do something cute and romantic, then it's over and then we never talk about it again. This isn't one of those times, right? Like, this counts for something?" his expression was hopeful.

"Of course this counts for something" Kasper put his hand on Strangle's shoulder. Kroe's talking about feelings lessons, think about the talking about feelings lessons "I... I like you. I really, really like you, Strangle, okay? I think you're really cool, but also, a good person, when I saw you the first time I thought that maybe you'll be kind of an asshole, but you're very much not that, you really care about other people, like the way you treat Alastyr... You're so great with kids, and just great in general, you have a kind heart, and you're so handsome, and I love talking to you, and..." he stopped upon seeing Strangle looking at him with the softest, most loving smile he has ever seen. He moved his hand up Kasper's chest and neck, stopping at the base of his face.

"I really like you too, Kasper" he gave him one more soft kiss. Kasper smiled like an idiot.

"Cool" 

"Cool" Strangle laughed "Why do we always do this, Kasper? Why can't we just keep a romantic moment going?"

"I don't know" Kasper sighed "What do people usually say after they make out?"

"I don't know, I've never really had an actual boyfriend"

"Yeah, me neither"

They both paused for a second, the realization of what they've just said slowly setting in.

"Oh... are we...?" Strangle started, his face getting maybe even more red than when they were kissing.

"I mean... if you wanna be...?

"I mean, if you wanna... then we can be"

"Yeah, okay"

"Okay"

"Cool"

"Cool"

"We're doing it again"

"I know" Strangle moved down, placing his head on Kasper's chest "Maybe we're just terrible at this"

"Mm. If this is what 'terrible' is like" he put his hand on the back of his boyfriend's neck "Then I don't care for being good" he saw him smile, his eyes closed.

"Can we stay here tonight? I'm too tired to go upstairs. And I don't want to ruin the moment for like the third time today"

"Sure. Goodnight"

"Goodnight" 

Kasper buried his hand in Strangle's hair and began to run his fingers through it, very slowly and gently, as to not wake him up. Strangle was a pretty big guy, certainly bigger than him, but in that moment, peacefully falling asleep in Kasper's arms... he felt so small. Like never before in his life Kasper felt the need to protect him, from dragons, from world-ending mushroom creatures, from anything that could ever hurt him. He felt like this universe, this cruel vacuum of space beyond the walls of this spaceship was so dangerous and scary, and so big, and Strangle was so small. So alone.

But not anymore. Kasper ran his fingers through his hair once more, pulling him close to his chest, he held him in his arms and smiled, closing his eyes. Not anymore.


	8. Never again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The party finds themselves in a world a little too familiar to Strangle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the comparatively longer break, schoolwork hit me out of nowhere so there are going to be slightly longer gaps between chapters now, but don't worry, I won't leave this unfinished!

As Kasper woke up, the first thing he felt was something heavy laying on his chest. He opened his eyes abruptly and flinched, a little startled and confused at first, but his expression soon turned into a smile. It was Strangle, who fell asleep in his arms the night before and was still locked within his embrace. He wasn't sleeping anymore though, instead he was looking at Kasper with a soft expression.

"Good morning" after just waking up his voice was raspier than usual "Did I scare you?"

"No, no, it's just that sometimes after I wake up I don't really know what's going on at first. It's an amnesia thing" Kasper rubbed his eyes a little "Anyway, how'd you sleep?"

"Good" Strangle squinted his eyes slightly, made his voice go even deeper, brought his face closer to Kasper's "You're very warm"

Kasper kind of thought that now that they kissed and established their feelings for each other that kick of emotions, the elevated heartbeat, the warm feeling in the face, the tingle in the stomach every time Strangle said something that even remotely resembled a flirt would die down at least a little bit, but it was as strong as ever. Kasper couldn't complain though. He enjoyed it.

He responded by giving Strangle a kiss on the bridge of the nose.

"You ready to go? We're getting the last egg today" 

"Today?" Strangle sighed "I really wish we could catch a break, it seems like we're in a constant rush"

"Yeah, I know what you mean... After this I'm going to be doing nothing for like a month"

"Mind if I join you?"

"Not at all" Kasper smiled "But now we gotta get-" he stopped to take a breath in "Do you smell something burning?"

"Yeah" Strangle got off the couch with a concerned look. 

They both entered the kitchen to find Alastyr taking two completely black pieces of toast out of the toaster. Upon noticing them enter, he turned to them with a nervous expression.

"Alastyr!" Kasper exhaled in relief "You scared me to death, I thought there was fire!"

"No, no, it's just me. I didn't really know how to operate this, and last time you said that I should make my own breakfast every once in a while, so I just thought-" he got interrupted by Kasper putting a hand on his head.

"Hey, it's okay, kiddo" he ruffled his hair a bunch "We'll throw them out and make new ones, okay? Strangle will show you how" Strangle nodded in agreement.

"Well, you're in a good mood today" Alastyr threw the burnt toast in the trash "What's gotten into you?"

"Excited to be saving the world is all" 

As Strangle began explaining to Alastyr what a toaster is and how it works (Alastyr was listening with eyes wide open) the two remaining party members entered the room and took seats at the table, waiting for breakfast to be served. When nobody else was looking, Kasper leaned back in his chair and mouthed 'I did it' to Kroe behind Flynn's back, to which he responded with a big smile and a thumbs up.

After Strangle took over the breakfast-making it went pretty quickly, and everyone was soon finishing up their food. As they all got up and ready to leave, Alastyr stopped them:

"Um, guys... I wanted to say sorry" he looked down at the ground.

"'Sorry'?" Kasper sounded confused "For what?"

"You know... last night? I overreacted... I know we had to steal the egg eventually, I just didn't want to do it so bad..."

"Hey, it's fine, boy" Kroe patted him on the back "I'm sorry too. I should've told you beforehand, I just felt pressured and got impatient to do it as quickly as possible" he gave him a hug.

"I'm sorry too" Flynn joined in the hug.

"Fine, me too" Kasper also joined and gestured for Strangle to get in there.

"I'm sorry too" he completed the group hug.

"You have nothing to be sorry for" Kroe laughed.

"Yeah, you're always so... not in fights with any of us" Alastyr agreed.

"Guys, guys, you're gonna make me blush" Strangle laughed and let go of the embrace "So are we ready to go?"

As everyone nodded their heads and broke away from the group hug, Kroe picked the egg up to his eye level and spoke the magic words:

"To get to the other side"

As they fell out of the portal in reality, they hit hard concrete, a surface most of the party members weren't that familiar with. But soon after they were met with a slightly more known to them sensation: the moldy smell of the purple mushrooms they saw that they in Humber.

As Kasper slowly got up, he noticed Strangle looking around him at the suburban streets with almost identical houses along them with a blank and confused expression. He walked up to him, putting his hand on his shoulder.

"Hey... Is everything alright?"

Strangle stayed silent for a few more seconds before turning to him and quietly replying:

"This is my world"

"Y-your world?" Flynn got up from the ground "I never knew you were from the... mushroom dimension"

"I'm not. It used to not be like this" Strangle looked around at the empty streets once more "But it got taken"

"You mean..." Alastyr walked up to him with a concerned expression "This is going to happen to our world?"

"If we don't stop it" Strangle nodded.

"Man..."

"Well, we better hurry then" Flynn started heading down the street, avoiding the purple sludge and ushered them to come with him.

"Oh, um..." Strangle put his hand up as if he was trying to stop him, but put it right back down again "Never mind. Let's go"

"No, what is it?" Kasper stopped the other guys to ask.

"It's just that... well, it's private" he looked down at the ground "I don't really want to talk about it too much, but I just... I haven't seen my house in a long, long time and it isn't far from here so I was just thinking... If we maybe could stop by... It'll be quick, I promise"

"Of course" Kasper's said softly, sliding his hand down Strangle's arm to put it in his hand.

"Well, um..." Flynn interrupted "We don't really have that much time... I'm not gonna lie to you guys, seeing this is kind of freaking me out, I don't want our world to be like this - no offense, Strangle - so I'd prefer to be as quick about this as possible"

"Maybe Kasper can go with Strangle and the rest of us can go looking for the egg and we'll meet up later?" Kroe suggested.

"But I wanna see Strangle's house too!" Alastyr looked a little disappointed.

"Well, this isn't a fucking field trip, Alastyr, okay?" everyone froze. This was the first time they ever heard Strangle get mad and raise his voice at one of the party members. The young alchemist looked down bashfully.

"S-sorry..."

Strangle took at deep breath in.

"It's fine, it's just... This is important to me, okay?"

"Okay..."

"So I think I'm gonna go now" he turned around and started heading down the street, not letting go of Kasper's hand. At first mostly being pulled along, Kasper turned around for a second to the party, then faced the direction they were going and caught up with Strangle. They didn't at all talk the whole way there.

Even though he was looking mainly at the ground, Strangle seemed to know his way there perfectly, he didn't hesitate at all as to where to turn. His breathing was getting heavier the further they walked. Kasper held his hand tighter, to which he responded with a sad smile.

Finally they stopped. Strangle didn't even have to turn his head to know that they were here. He closed his eyes for a second, then looked up and to the right, at a house they were standing in front of. Kasper looked with him.

The house looked almost identical to all the other houses within the area. It wasn't particularly big, looked perfectly sized for a family of three or four. The grass in the yard was completely purple, with mushrooms growing up the tree, on the tire swing laying on the ground, the rope it was previously hanging from almost completely dissolved by the sludge. Fungi was creeping up the light brown and brick walls, but the house wasn't completely covered in it, you could definitely enter inside. After so many years, the growth seemed to slow down. It was certainly nowhere near as dynamic as whatever was going on in Humber.

Strangle stood in front of the house for a few seconds, not saying anything, just staring at it. Kasper finally spoke:

"If you changed your mind... We don't have to go in. I understand"

"I didn't change my mind, it's just that... I kept pushing all those feelings down for so long" he shook his head slowly "I never looked back. I never talked to anyone about this aside from just brief mentions. I tried to just not think about it. I bottled it all up. Out of sight, out of mind, y'know?" he gave him a sad smile "I knew I'd have to confront it eventually, I just didn't think it was going to be so soon. Maybe that's a good thing, you know? Maybe it'll be cathartic to go in there. But I don't know, Kasper, I just don't know... I'm sorry to drop this all on you, especially after last night"

"Strangle, it's okay" he turned to him, held both his hands in his own "I'm here for you, okay? Don't feel bad about this. It's okay"

"Okay" he took one more deep breath in and turned to face the house "Can you please... not let go of my hand while we're in there?"

"I won't. I promise"

Strangle slowly stepped towards the door, with Kasper right by his side. The overgrown purple grass snapped below their feet like dry, thin sticks. Strangle hesitated for a second before putting his hand on the doorknob and pushing it to open the door.

The faint scent of mold present everywhere seemed to get stronger as they went inside - seemingly none of the windows or doors were open when Strangle's family left. They stepped inside a narrow hallway with a door on their left and a chest of drawers on the right, with three pictures on top of it. 

One of them was of probably around five year old Strangle sitting on the tire swing, smiling happily. He was missing one of his front teeth. The other one was from the wedding day of who Kasper assumed to be Strangle's parents, Mr and Mrs MaCock, both very tall and of dark black hair. He certainly looked a lot like them. The last one was of them all together on some sort of tower, with a view of a beautiful city behind them: Strangle looked to be around twelve in the picture. They both stared at the photos for a few seconds, before Strangle started heading onward.

They entered the living room, separated from the kitchen only by a small bar: the place really wasn't big at all. The couch and chairs were a toned red, and all the wooden furniture was dark oak. On the kitchen table there was a big blue mug with a heart pattern and an empty plate. Sludge seemed to be growing out of the mug. Strangle looked at it for a moment before saying:

"That's my mom's" Kasper just nodded his head in response "She never finished it..."

After a moment of silence they began heading upstairs. Kasper looked a little unsure as the steps creaked loudly upon being stepped on, but Strangle didn't seem to care or notice. 

On the next floor, they were met with another corridor, with two doors on either sides of it. One was plain oak and the other read, in very faint letters that you could just barely make out: "STRANGLE'S ROOM!!!" It was the first time Kasper has seen him smile since they entered, albeit very faintly and sadly.

"Do you wanna go in?" Kasper asked after a few more seconds of silence.

"Yeah, just... give me a second"

Strangle slowly opened the door and it creaked loudly. 

The inside, like the entire rest of the house, wasn't very big. The main eye-catching things inside were the bed, door to the closet and desk. There wasn't really much else in the room, not a lot of decorations, just the essentials. Some, clothes were scattered about the floor, now with fungi growing on them.

As they stepped inside, Kasper took a look at the desk, noticing two pictures of preteen Strangle with a blond, slightly shorter than him boy, also around the same age. In one of the pictures Strangle was running with the other boy on his back on a beach, the water splashing under his bare feet. On the other they were both standing next to a fake dinosaur, pretending like it was going to eat them. 

Strangle walked up to the desk and picked up the first photo. He looked at it for a few seconds before showing it to Kasper.

"That's Dave"

"Hm" he took it in his hands and examined it. They both seemed so happy "Who's Dave?"

"He was... a good friend of mine" Strangle looked to the side "I cared a lot about the guy. We stuck together most of our childhoods. And he was one of the last people that survived" 

"Huh. Seems like... a good friend" he handed him back the picture.

"He was" 

Strangle stared at the photo for a couple more seconds, before breaking the frame open and folding it in half and putting it in his pocket. He then looked around the room, before turning his eyes to meet Kasper's.

"You know" he started "This whole thing... being here... it's a lot. I did not expect this. I never expected to be here again. And now I am and I just feel... empty. Maybe not 'empty', more like... like hollow. It's the same, thing whatever, what I'm trying to say is... I'm sorry, I'm stumbling, I'm a mess" he chuckled sadly.

"It's okay. Talk as much as you want. I understand that it's overwhelming"

"Thank you"

"No problem"

"I feel like... I guess I thought that this is going to give me some sort of closure, you know? I spent so long running from this, but standing at the door I thought: 'Hey, maybe this is a good thing, maybe it'll help fill that hole in my heart that I've had for so long'. I thought... I don't know, I guess I thought I'd find s o m e t h i n g. And there's nothing. It's exactly like I remember it. And that makes me feel..." he looked down at the ground and bit his lip "Like it's always going to be like this. Like this'll never change. Like I'll always feel this way" he closed his eyes and Kasper saw a single tear roll down his cheek. 

"Hey, hey, it's okay..." he said softly and walked up to him, wiping the tear from his face with his thumb "Do you want me to hug you?" Strangle just nodded his head.

Kasper immediately went for the hug, putting his hands over Strangle's shoulders and bringing his head to his shoulder, he started stroking his hair. Strangle wrapped his hands tightly around his waist. Kasper didn't hear him cry, but he felt his shoulder get wet.

He closed his eyes, pulling him in closer, he made shushing noises for a few seconds. Kasper felt his eyes stinging a little, like he was about to cry too.

This was awful. It felt so genuinely heartbreaking, seeing Strangle like this. He knew the story and felt bad for him before, but this was different. Witnessing the pain of losing everything first hand... it was something Kasper never wanted to see in his life again. Once again he got the same feeling as last night: that Strangle was so small, and everything around him was big and dangerous, and that danger was coming for him. Kasper pulled away to look Strangle in the eye, he put their foreheads together.

"Hey, it's okay, okay? I got you, see? I got you. I will never, ever let something like this happen again. I'll protect you, I'll protect you with everything I've got..."

Kasper gave him a kiss on the side of the head and held him closer, pulling him back in for the hug.

"Never, ever again..."


End file.
